The present disclosure relates to methods of using a printing device. More specifically, the present disclosure relates to methods of conserving energy used by a printing device through the use of a variable network connection.
Copiers, printers, scanners and multifunction printing devices are familiar in many office environments. (As used herein, all such machines will be generically called “printing devices.”) A printing device may be connected to a high-speed network via a network adapter or interface in the printing device. The network adapter or interface is generally configured to continually operate at a high-speed such that any incoming documents to be printed are received quickly and further processed by the printing device. The speed of the network adapter or interface is generally determined based upon the potential speed of the data network the printing device is connected to. For example, if a printing device is connected to a Gigabit Ethernet (i.e., a network having a maximum data transfer rate of 1 gigabit per second), the network adapter or interface is generally configured to operate at one gigabit per second. By maintaining a high network speed (i.e., one gigabit per second), a large number of incoming documents or print jobs may be processed throughout a specific time period such as an eight-hour business day. However, the network adapter or interface requires a large amount of energy to maintain the high-speed connection.
It is generally known in the office equipment industry that printing devices may have active and inactive states. Typically, a printing device will be consuming more energy during an active state than an inactive state. Thus, to conserve energy a printing device may enter the inactive state after an idle period. However, regardless of what state the printing device is in, the network adapter or interface remains functioning at its previously established high-speed network connection.